Great Falls, MT
Above: If you’ve ever wondered what the view is like from the expensive seats, here it is. That’s right folks, in Great Falls you too can have an up-close view of the ump’s butt, for only $8!
Above: The hostel in Great Falls.
Above: I opened up a shop in Great Falls to sell my photos from this trip.
Sunday, 7/2, 1am
Great Falls, MT
Coordinates: didn’t get a reading
Yesterday’s mileage:
Today’s destination: Tori and I are going to rent a canoe and paddle down the Missouri River for 3 days. Tori arrives at 11am.
I arrived in Great Falls on Friday afternoon, with enough time to get my broken spoke replaced at a bike shop (called Knicker Biker. It’s a nice shop) and to get a hair cut. I spent some time exploring the downtown area, but it all seemed empty and deserted. Generally, I look for restaurants or cafes where people are hanging out, but I couldn’t find anything like that, despite the fact that the town has 60,000 residents. The coolest thing I have found is the hostel where I’m staying. It’s a neat little house that one guy lives in. He did the Southern Tier bicycle trip several years ago, and afterwards he decided to convert part of his house into a hostel. Other than that, the word that unfortunately comes to my mind to describe the feeling in Great Falls is “tired”.
Regardless, on the heels of seeing a minor league baseball game in Missoula, I biked across town to watch the Great Falls White Sox play the Billings Mustangs. If you recall from my Missoula posting, the Billings Mustangs beat the Missoula Ospreys the night that I saw them play. I must be good luck for Billings, because they crushed Great Falls too.
When I approached the ticket sales window, I didn’t have any cash on me so I asked to pay by credit card. The woman told me to walk around to the side to sign my receipt. I walked through the gates and was stopped by a friendly, sharp-looking man who said, “Lance? Well, come on in!” I should mention that due to some logistical issues at the laundrymat, I was wearing my bright yellow jersey to the game, as dorky as that sounds (and looks).
I gave the guy a half-smile, because at this point I’ve heard so many Lance Armstrong jokes that I just kinda play along now. Come on people! It’s not like I call everyone driving a car Dale Earnhart! Nonetheless, I explained to the man that I was traveling on my bicycle from San Francisco, and he became noticeably excited. He pulled out his business card, which read “Jim Keough, General Manager”. Subsequently, he personally ushered me to my seat, which happened to be 2nd row behind home plate. Jim even took off his enormous, diamond-covered gold ring that he received after the Chicago White Sox won the World Series, and he put it on a table to let me have a close look (the Great Falls White Sox are affiliated with the Chicago White Sox). I got the royal treatment, to say the least. A few innings later, I even had one of the ushers come down and say, “So, I hear you’ve got an interesting story…” It was a lot of fun and quite the experience. I left feeling ever more convinced that minor league sports are the way to go! That kind of experience just wouldn’t happen at a big league game.
Fast forward a few hours. There’s a bar in Great Falls that GQ magazine declared the #1 Bar in the World to Travel to. No joke. GQ ranked bars that would be worth taking trips to visit, and a bar in Great Falls was at the top of the list. Replete with skepticism, I decided that if there’s ANYTHING in Great Falls that a national magazine spent the time to write about, then it may be worth a look-see.
This bar, called Sip And Dip, is located in a motel that has a pool. The bar designers were clever enough to place a large glass window behind the bar that looks directly into the pool. The bar then hires attractive, curvaceous women, known as the “mermaids”, to swim around in the pool, creating quite the spectacle for would-be barflies.
Well, the mermaids didn’t show up at the bar tonight, but Bill and Carl did. I’m beginning to think that I could write a book about the characters that I’ve met at bars on this trip. When I entered the bar, Bill (as I later learned is his name) was sitting by himself at the last bar stool on the far end of the bar. He looks like a tall version of Mr. Burns (from the Simpsons), with a bit more hair. When he does talk, which is not often, he has a slight stutter. However, mostly he just sits there drinking his Olympia beer, which both he and the bartender call “Olly”.
Soon after I took a seat near Bill, Carl walked in. It was hard to miss Carl. He had a grey ZZ Top beard, a Tommy Bahama straw hat and shorts. I couldn’t quite figure him out when I first saw him. He kinda looked like he’d washed ashore from a Jimmy Buffet music video.
Anyway, Carl and I soon began talking, with Bill silently nodding along nearby. Perhaps I should have known, but Carl turned out to be a fishing guide from Alaska. I didn’t quite understand his story, but it went something like this: He originally came to Helena, MT, to visit his ex-wife, but shortly thereafter, he traveled to Pennsylvania to spend some time with his dad, and then somehow flew back to Montana, but the closest he could get to Helena was Great Falls. That part confused me, but the details didn’t seem hugely significant.
Anyway, I mentioned the I recently learned that the capital of Alaska, Juneau, has no roads leading into or out of it. In fact, there are only two mechanized ways to reach Juneau: by boat or by plane. That must have hit Carl’s political nerve, because went on for the next half an hour about how the government should be overthrown and how society is going to crumble some day soon. Of course, he added that when it does, he’ll be ready, because he knows how to live off the land. After his fourth double-whisky and soda, he offered his own explanation of why Juneau has no roads in or out: so we can’t run the politicians out of town! (with that, I suddenly envisioned a brilliant solution to the US’s problems, but it’ll have to wait until I get further east…)
Bill didn’t add any solutions to the “political problems” that Carl raised, although he did seem to be looking hard for them at the bottom of his can of “Olly”. On the other hand, Bill knew where to find the restroom, which proved to be the most useful advice of the evening (and a welcomed solution to a more pressing issue anyway).
I spent about two hours at the Sip and Dip, searching for clues as to how it could possibly the #1 bar in the world to travel to. I never figured it out, but I suppose that GQ doesn’t have to worry about anyone contesting their rankings, because it’s a safe bet that few people will ever actually fly to Great Falls, Montana to find out.
Well, Tori is flying into Great Falls tomorrow (actually, today). She’s going to spend her 4th of July weekend floating down the Missouri River with me. We arranged for a canoe rental company to drive the rental car to our take-out site, so we’ll just float down the river and then drive back. It’s going to be a blast!
Observation:
There are lots of Confederate flags in Great Falls. By itself, that’s creepy, but it’s even stranger given that Montana was never even in the Confederacy. There are no laws against being an idiot, I guess.
Tags: Travel
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